Taekwondo – Living through Major Che!
A powerful reverie overcame me as I listened to Master Steve issue the familiar Korean commands. Proudly and silently, we watched our Major Che execute various stances, punches, blocks and kicks.
Advertisement
For a relatively inexperienced six-year-old, I was so impressed with his obvious massive potential. He would more than make up for all my limitations in Taekwondo, I felt instinctively. We would still get the black belt, after all!
Che appeared very focused, listened keenly and moved fairly rapidly in response to the commands. Also, he had balance when he kicked. Perhaps above all, he was having fun, completely enthralled by Master Steve, his inspirational teacher. When he executed 15 press-ups non-stop, positioned totally parallel to the floor, I groaned silently, feeling his effort.
The ever-present raw emotion took me many many years back into time. I was about twice Che’s current age. Our family had relocated to Abeka-Fadama, Accra, from Berekum. In Berekum, my father had resigned his job as the Principal of the Berekum Training College, enroute to a decade-long Nigerian adventure.
Having been a boarding pupil/student right from Achimota Primary through to secondary, I only appeared at Abeka-Fadama during my vacations. I found my life a little too cocooned; from the sweet confines of a campus environment in Berekum through my thoroughly enjoyable boarding school life.
On my Fadama primary school holidays, we played an awful lot; football—‘small posts’, ‘stay’, ‘organised matches with other communities— chaskele, extensive purposeless roaming et al. I played and excelled so much at football a friend once encouraged me at one point to “forget this boarding school business and let’s join some colts football club.”
Football was best when played among age mates of comparable physique, without a big bully boy to kick us about. The appearance of any such big bully boy (e.g. Sakora or Quaycoo) often inspired fear and panic.
Clearly, I was somewhat unprepared for the somewhat rough rumble and tumble life and play in my Fadama life.
I became the boy who owned the football (case five) but for whom access to the game in the presence of big boys could not always be guaranteed.
And then Eboue appeared in the community. In his late twenties, whispers had it that he was a Togolese political dissident, running away from a botched coup against President Eyadema.
He was also a black belt Taekwondo master. Very soon, he started mobilising the boys in the community for Taekwondo training. We went through various stances, punches, blocks, kicks, and many sparring sessions.
For some inexplicable reason, Eboue took to me. He would print out additional reading material on the discipline of martial arts and personally bring them to me. My confidence soared.
I watched in disbelief as I was called upon to spar with my age mates, including some who struck fear in me. Given that we had gone through the same exercises, been taught the same kicks and executed the same number of press-ups, I had no reason to maintain my sheer terror of some of these boys.
To boost my confidence further, the Master would compliment me whenever I executed a particular technique well.
Both during formal training in the house of the once well-known Dr Yogi Sri Ram Beckley and during our play times, we sparred continuously. Taekwondo had proved to be an inspirational equaliser. We were now equal. I had learnt to fight systematically. And fear was gone!
Frequent interruptions from my boarding school life, however, prevented me from making the kind of progress I yearned for in the martial arts. Of course, I had another brief stint with the Missus in our first-year Legon University days. This was also interrupted by this medical school admission business. Much later in Fadama, Dr Beckley’s house and clinic would be totally burnt down on the back of unproven community rumours and Eboue, reportedly killed in a violent attack.
When the Missus discovered the opportunity at Pippa’s Fitness Centre to enroll Major Che in the Taekwondo class of the patient and inspirational Master Steve, we grabbed it with both hands. Master Steve is President of the Ghana Taekwondo Association. Prior to this, I had done an excellent job preaching and shamelessly propagandising on the key tenets of Taekwondo – courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control and an indomitable spirit. In addition, Che and I had engaged in enough rudimentary sparring and Korean language shenanigans to sufficiently fire him up for the Taekwondo class.
The belts I missed, Che will amass. The tournaments I couldn’t attend, Che will triumph at. The examinations I did not take, Che will pass. The nascent student hood I failed to progress from, Che will surely graduate as a true Black belt Master!
The hour is up! The results of the previous week’s examinations are being read out. Master Che has passed his very first White Belt examinations. Beaming with infectious smiles, the Missus and I enthusiastically congratulate him. In a daze, we saunter over with Che to pick Aseye, our talented ballerina!
www.sodzisodzi.com